Thank you for the Sherwood Anderson quote Linh. After mentioning him in your last piece, I remembered a poem about him by Charles Bukowski and had to look it up.
Both of my parents grew up on small family farms. The Sherwood Anderson line about the virtue of basic innocence reminded me of a photo of my paternal grandparents around the time of their marriage in the nineteen thirties. Those were hard times but the contentment in their faces was genuine. This one really hit home. Two generations removed from that and I can feel it. I'm so glad that I got to experience a small bit of that life before it went away. Summers detasseling corn stuck with me. I guess that's why working a ketchup tomato harvest recently was a true joy. I'd tear up sometimes as the sunrises hit us, sadness and joy too strong for a straight face. No big deal in the middle of a field.
566. one for Sherwood Anderson - Charles Bukowski
sometimes I forget about him and his peculiar
innocence, almost idiotic, awkward and mawkish.
he liked walking over bridges and through cornfields.
tonight I think about him, the way the lines were,
Here in my corner of Asia I’m pleased to know that you, Linh, have eyes to see what so many other people can’t see or pretend not to. Enjoy the rest of this beautiful day.
The last time I was in Tokyo and Osaka, I drove my Japanese friends crazy by gushing over Japan. They were like, you don't live here, so you don't really know. You've spent decades there, however, and seem very content. If nothing else, the Japanese sense of beauty is awe inspiring. Just about everything looks great there.
P.S. As for Vietnamese, they're often as tacky as they come. It's as if they're oblivious to how they're seen. This also shows up in their dancing. Although they can't dance worth beans, they keep doing it, and very publicly, too, because it feels great.
Things look great here, and oftentimes things are actually pretty good. Not always, but it’s one of the few places where people of all ages are still fairly decent. Children are respectful, elderly are gracious. Young adults and middle aged people are a bit stressed. By the way, I enjoy your photos and videos of people, especially those who are dancing in Vung Tau, they have no shame🤣! 🤩👍🏾
Japan is a relatively soulless place although yeah they do put a lot of care into external appearances. Partly though this is also something that can get on your nerves. It's lacking really in heart. The emotional element is nullified completely so yes it is 'calm' but the problem is there's no spirit or joy or creativity. Just technique and routine. Good place to learn some sort of craft or WORK. Not to live.
In the West the allowed opinions have narrowed on most issues to 1 that is permitted, while the need to be enthusiastic about it has increased dramatically.
Fascinating development in the supposed conservative state of Indiana. A child was taken away from parents because they would not use the preferred pronouns. That was a quick trip from love is love.
Ah, life in the land of the brave and home of the free.
Arnold Schwarzenegger, actor and former governor of California, starred in a movie many years ago about a man who became pregnant. If I recall correctly the persona in the movie had dismissed childbearing too offhandedly and decided to experience first hand what women had to go through. It was an awful movie.
One of the main ways the capitalist ownership class in America keeps the working class rabble in line is through the age-old "divide and conquer" strategy. As long as the working class is quibbling and arguing over inanities and inconsequential things they won't pay too much attention to how much of America's wealth (created by the work of the working class) is being aggregated by the few at the top; the financial top one to three percent, while something like 30 million Americans (about 10% of the population) live in poverty.
To get more to the article's opening point: when a population has internalized self blame that population won't seek to find solutions for the external injustices built in to society by seeking to reform institutions or critique regressive structures like a tax system with relatively high sales taxes (often even on groceries) and low taxes and tax loopholes for the very wealthy. (Why is the Federal Income Tax Code so long? Because it is riddled with loopholes to allow the rich to escape taxes.)
Americans often seem to be more envious of their neighbors new, expensive, late-model car than angry or at least questioning why people like Bezos and Musk have hundreds of billions of dollars.
My contention is that this is the way American financial elites like it. The working class at each other's throats blaming the "illegal aliens" (Fox News plays that canard to the hilt) the undeserving guy next door collecting food stamps (that's me, the lazy, no good bum) or the welfare cheat getting "something for nothing."
I believe Congress is attempting to outlaw Universal Basic Income because the Republicans believe money should never be simply given away. Poor people will be forced to work for money. Of course it's perfectly okay when their rich Republican friends get something for free. They're "deserving." Poor folks (like me on food stamps) are not.
I wonder if that mentality is being exported to other parts of the world? The poor in society squabble over the few crumbs that fall off the capitalist banquet table while the rich laugh at the dumb suckers at the bottom, and laugh all the way to the bank.
It is a reality that many jobs have disappeared not by going overseas, but by automation. Extend that thought for a moment, and picture that science-fiction (?) world we sometimes hear talked about, where automation and AI have completely eliminated the need for anyone to work. With work no longer the basis for the distribution of society's resources, how would we decide then to allocate them?
The closer we get to that world, the more inevitable it seems UBI must become.
I personally believe many Republican lawmakers would rather see the poorest, most dispossessed Americans beg for food, become homeless and ultimately starve to death (if the food pantries all close) than give them Universal Basic Income.
But maybe that's just me. Maybe you're right; in the long run, as Capitalism dries up and dies in America (see the works of Yanis Veroufakos and Dr. Richard Wolff for more on this if you are so inclined) perhaps even the Republicans will accept UBI as necessary.
By the way, as an irrelevant aside to the thread, Dr. Veroufakos (a former financial minister of Greece who essentially sacrificed his career to prevent the German banks from privatizing Greece after the 2008-9 financial meltdown caused largely by the derivatives trade bubble deflating) has characterized the post-capitalist American economy as a sort of neo-feudalism with rentiers like Bezos and Bill Gates extracting wealth through the business platforms they have set up. Dr. Veroufakos can explain how this works better than I can.
You may have already heard of him, but Dr. Michael Hudson's analyses have really helped me gain a better understanding of the century spanning wealth racket, the privatization of everything which you describe. I've seen him on the Dialogue Works YouTube channel with Dr. Wolff who I wasn't aware of until recently. It took me a few decades before I smacked my forehead with my palm and realized, "By golly, it's all a scam and by these rules I'm kinda f*"'ed." Economists like Dr.'s Wolff and Hudson have given me a much better understanding of the specific elements of what to me is a wholly corrupted system of finance.
I read Varoufakis' book "Adults in the Room" where he describes all that. It was a fascinating read, and it really shows you the evil side of the European establishment. I recently started following his blog.
I absolutely "love" Dr. Hudson. (In a platonic, intellectual way.) Like Richard Wolff he explains economic principles from a working class perspective. '
There is a reason the discipline of economics is known as the "dismal science." Too often it is taught (and thus understood) from the perspective of the capitalist owners of society. Not the perspective of those who actually work for a living and in doing so create the wealth of a nation.
Too often the wealthy are lauded and even venerated. That's why people such as Elon Musk, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos are allowed to get away with so much what essentially amounts to legalized theft of the wealth of a nation. We all know the old saying, "behind every great fortune is a great crime." It's too bad more working class Americans haven't taken those words to heart.
And lest we forget, When Musk and Bezos are enriched by Billions of dollars then hundreds of corporate CEOs pay themselves 50 million a year instead of a "mere" 5 million; and their lieutenants and CFOs want 2 million a year instead of a mere $500,000. So the already rich get richer at the expense of the workers beneath them. Some of whom must settle for the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour.
Since Reagan's term began 43 years ago the only thing that has "trickled down" (you remember the "supply side" economic scam in which tax cuts for the rich were supposed to "trickle down" to the working class?) is greed.
Is this the Michael Hudson that wrote the book "...and forgive them their debts"? I've had that for a long time, but have never been able to get around to reading it.
Yes. Absolutely. He argues that debts hurt not just the debtor but society as whole.
I'm like that too with books. I had Henry George's "Progress and Poverty" on the floor next to my desk in my apartment in Sacramento, CA for a couple of years and never got around to it. I eventually got priced out of that apartment from run-away rent increases and lost that book while moving.
"Like a modern CEO, Jesse Bentley saw others as just resources..."
This seems to be the primary ethic of most Americans today. When looking at each other the first question is, 'how can you enrich me?' If you don't think like this in America's giant game of poker, you're the patsy sitting at the table. This is why a lot of good people are getting up from the table and walking away. Just let the selfish assholes eat each other.
It is interesting that a close reading of authors writing over a century ago reveals amazing prescience. Many of them saw things coming, even that long ago, that have materialized into our modern day reality. Or maybe it was not prescience, but the ability to observe much of what has always been part of human behavior before it became obvious to most people.
"Winesburg, Ohio" was a great book--I can see why so many writers point to it as a model. And although I have found reading Melville sometimes heavy going, I myself had frequent recourse to Bartleby's slogan, "I prefer not to." I think more and more people are starting to pick up on that, especially in the up-and-coming generation.
Drifted to Chicago, then Paris. Chummy with Gertrude Stein. Four marriages. His last house was in Appalachian Virginia. Died while on a cruise after swallowing a toothpick!
The toothpick! Had forgot about that. Thanks. One of the most pure and sweet anecdotes I know from literature’s nest of envy is his recall of young Ernest Hemingway cleaning out his place to move to Paris. He put all the canned goods in a box and brought them over. The author remembered years later the younger man charging up the stairs with a box of food.
Thank you for the Sherwood Anderson quote Linh. After mentioning him in your last piece, I remembered a poem about him by Charles Bukowski and had to look it up.
Both of my parents grew up on small family farms. The Sherwood Anderson line about the virtue of basic innocence reminded me of a photo of my paternal grandparents around the time of their marriage in the nineteen thirties. Those were hard times but the contentment in their faces was genuine. This one really hit home. Two generations removed from that and I can feel it. I'm so glad that I got to experience a small bit of that life before it went away. Summers detasseling corn stuck with me. I guess that's why working a ketchup tomato harvest recently was a true joy. I'd tear up sometimes as the sunrises hit us, sadness and joy too strong for a straight face. No big deal in the middle of a field.
566. one for Sherwood Anderson - Charles Bukowski
sometimes I forget about him and his peculiar
innocence, almost idiotic, awkward and mawkish.
he liked walking over bridges and through cornfields.
tonight I think about him, the way the lines were,
one felt space between his lines, were,
and felt space between his lines, air
and he told it so the lines remained
carved there
something like van Gogh.
he took his time
looking about
sometimes running to save something.
then at other times giving it all away
he didn't understand Hemingway's neon tattoo,
found Faulkner much too clever.
he was a midwestern hick
he took his time.
he was as far away from Fitzgerald as he was
from Paris
Here in my corner of Asia I’m pleased to know that you, Linh, have eyes to see what so many other people can’t see or pretend not to. Enjoy the rest of this beautiful day.
Hi Robert,
The last time I was in Tokyo and Osaka, I drove my Japanese friends crazy by gushing over Japan. They were like, you don't live here, so you don't really know. You've spent decades there, however, and seem very content. If nothing else, the Japanese sense of beauty is awe inspiring. Just about everything looks great there.
Linh
P.S. As for Vietnamese, they're often as tacky as they come. It's as if they're oblivious to how they're seen. This also shows up in their dancing. Although they can't dance worth beans, they keep doing it, and very publicly, too, because it feels great.
Things look great here, and oftentimes things are actually pretty good. Not always, but it’s one of the few places where people of all ages are still fairly decent. Children are respectful, elderly are gracious. Young adults and middle aged people are a bit stressed. By the way, I enjoy your photos and videos of people, especially those who are dancing in Vung Tau, they have no shame🤣! 🤩👍🏾
Japan is a relatively soulless place although yeah they do put a lot of care into external appearances. Partly though this is also something that can get on your nerves. It's lacking really in heart. The emotional element is nullified completely so yes it is 'calm' but the problem is there's no spirit or joy or creativity. Just technique and routine. Good place to learn some sort of craft or WORK. Not to live.
In the West the allowed opinions have narrowed on most issues to 1 that is permitted, while the need to be enthusiastic about it has increased dramatically.
Fascinating development in the supposed conservative state of Indiana. A child was taken away from parents because they would not use the preferred pronouns. That was a quick trip from love is love.
Ah, life in the land of the brave and home of the free.
Arnold Schwarzenegger, actor and former governor of California, starred in a movie many years ago about a man who became pregnant. If I recall correctly the persona in the movie had dismissed childbearing too offhandedly and decided to experience first hand what women had to go through. It was an awful movie.
One of the main ways the capitalist ownership class in America keeps the working class rabble in line is through the age-old "divide and conquer" strategy. As long as the working class is quibbling and arguing over inanities and inconsequential things they won't pay too much attention to how much of America's wealth (created by the work of the working class) is being aggregated by the few at the top; the financial top one to three percent, while something like 30 million Americans (about 10% of the population) live in poverty.
To get more to the article's opening point: when a population has internalized self blame that population won't seek to find solutions for the external injustices built in to society by seeking to reform institutions or critique regressive structures like a tax system with relatively high sales taxes (often even on groceries) and low taxes and tax loopholes for the very wealthy. (Why is the Federal Income Tax Code so long? Because it is riddled with loopholes to allow the rich to escape taxes.)
Americans often seem to be more envious of their neighbors new, expensive, late-model car than angry or at least questioning why people like Bezos and Musk have hundreds of billions of dollars.
My contention is that this is the way American financial elites like it. The working class at each other's throats blaming the "illegal aliens" (Fox News plays that canard to the hilt) the undeserving guy next door collecting food stamps (that's me, the lazy, no good bum) or the welfare cheat getting "something for nothing."
I believe Congress is attempting to outlaw Universal Basic Income because the Republicans believe money should never be simply given away. Poor people will be forced to work for money. Of course it's perfectly okay when their rich Republican friends get something for free. They're "deserving." Poor folks (like me on food stamps) are not.
I wonder if that mentality is being exported to other parts of the world? The poor in society squabble over the few crumbs that fall off the capitalist banquet table while the rich laugh at the dumb suckers at the bottom, and laugh all the way to the bank.
It is a reality that many jobs have disappeared not by going overseas, but by automation. Extend that thought for a moment, and picture that science-fiction (?) world we sometimes hear talked about, where automation and AI have completely eliminated the need for anyone to work. With work no longer the basis for the distribution of society's resources, how would we decide then to allocate them?
The closer we get to that world, the more inevitable it seems UBI must become.
Hi Bill,
I personally believe many Republican lawmakers would rather see the poorest, most dispossessed Americans beg for food, become homeless and ultimately starve to death (if the food pantries all close) than give them Universal Basic Income.
But maybe that's just me. Maybe you're right; in the long run, as Capitalism dries up and dies in America (see the works of Yanis Veroufakos and Dr. Richard Wolff for more on this if you are so inclined) perhaps even the Republicans will accept UBI as necessary.
By the way, as an irrelevant aside to the thread, Dr. Veroufakos (a former financial minister of Greece who essentially sacrificed his career to prevent the German banks from privatizing Greece after the 2008-9 financial meltdown caused largely by the derivatives trade bubble deflating) has characterized the post-capitalist American economy as a sort of neo-feudalism with rentiers like Bezos and Bill Gates extracting wealth through the business platforms they have set up. Dr. Veroufakos can explain how this works better than I can.
Hi Tom,
You may have already heard of him, but Dr. Michael Hudson's analyses have really helped me gain a better understanding of the century spanning wealth racket, the privatization of everything which you describe. I've seen him on the Dialogue Works YouTube channel with Dr. Wolff who I wasn't aware of until recently. It took me a few decades before I smacked my forehead with my palm and realized, "By golly, it's all a scam and by these rules I'm kinda f*"'ed." Economists like Dr.'s Wolff and Hudson have given me a much better understanding of the specific elements of what to me is a wholly corrupted system of finance.
I read Varoufakis' book "Adults in the Room" where he describes all that. It was a fascinating read, and it really shows you the evil side of the European establishment. I recently started following his blog.
Hi Troy and Bill,
I absolutely "love" Dr. Hudson. (In a platonic, intellectual way.) Like Richard Wolff he explains economic principles from a working class perspective. '
There is a reason the discipline of economics is known as the "dismal science." Too often it is taught (and thus understood) from the perspective of the capitalist owners of society. Not the perspective of those who actually work for a living and in doing so create the wealth of a nation.
Too often the wealthy are lauded and even venerated. That's why people such as Elon Musk, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos are allowed to get away with so much what essentially amounts to legalized theft of the wealth of a nation. We all know the old saying, "behind every great fortune is a great crime." It's too bad more working class Americans haven't taken those words to heart.
And lest we forget, When Musk and Bezos are enriched by Billions of dollars then hundreds of corporate CEOs pay themselves 50 million a year instead of a "mere" 5 million; and their lieutenants and CFOs want 2 million a year instead of a mere $500,000. So the already rich get richer at the expense of the workers beneath them. Some of whom must settle for the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour.
Since Reagan's term began 43 years ago the only thing that has "trickled down" (you remember the "supply side" economic scam in which tax cuts for the rich were supposed to "trickle down" to the working class?) is greed.
Is this the Michael Hudson that wrote the book "...and forgive them their debts"? I've had that for a long time, but have never been able to get around to reading it.
Yes. Absolutely. He argues that debts hurt not just the debtor but society as whole.
I'm like that too with books. I had Henry George's "Progress and Poverty" on the floor next to my desk in my apartment in Sacramento, CA for a couple of years and never got around to it. I eventually got priced out of that apartment from run-away rent increases and lost that book while moving.
"Like a modern CEO, Jesse Bentley saw others as just resources..."
This seems to be the primary ethic of most Americans today. When looking at each other the first question is, 'how can you enrich me?' If you don't think like this in America's giant game of poker, you're the patsy sitting at the table. This is why a lot of good people are getting up from the table and walking away. Just let the selfish assholes eat each other.
It is interesting that a close reading of authors writing over a century ago reveals amazing prescience. Many of them saw things coming, even that long ago, that have materialized into our modern day reality. Or maybe it was not prescience, but the ability to observe much of what has always been part of human behavior before it became obvious to most people.
"Winesburg, Ohio" was a great book--I can see why so many writers point to it as a model. And although I have found reading Melville sometimes heavy going, I myself had frequent recourse to Bartleby's slogan, "I prefer not to." I think more and more people are starting to pick up on that, especially in the up-and-coming generation.
I just discovered the James Alexander Thom novel, "Follow the River". After watching the terrible, sanitized, movie version.
One of my longtime books. Know his story? Businessman. Paint I think. Just walked out one day.
Yo Dan,
Drifted to Chicago, then Paris. Chummy with Gertrude Stein. Four marriages. His last house was in Appalachian Virginia. Died while on a cruise after swallowing a toothpick!
Linh
The toothpick! Had forgot about that. Thanks. One of the most pure and sweet anecdotes I know from literature’s nest of envy is his recall of young Ernest Hemingway cleaning out his place to move to Paris. He put all the canned goods in a box and brought them over. The author remembered years later the younger man charging up the stairs with a box of food.